


Love at 50th sight

by ChrisJP



Category: SPN, Supernatural, destiel - Fandom
Genre: ?? - Freeform, Alternate Universe - College/University, Angst, Bisexual Castiel, Castiel-centric, College, College Student Castiel, College Student Dean, F/M, Implied/Referenced Drug Addiction, Implied/Referenced Drug Use, It's midnight, M/M, POV Castiel, Self Confidence Issues, idk - Freeform, just sad!cas, kind of angst?, kind-of end!verse cas, sad!castiel, so i wrote
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-05-14
Updated: 2015-08-03
Packaged: 2018-03-30 12:01:36
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 2,728
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3936040
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ChrisJP/pseuds/ChrisJP
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>They became friends. Cas and Dean. They would hang out, and have lunch together, and they knew each-other’s coffee order by heart, and Dean would go out of his way just to make sure Cas was alright and in his own dorm, and they would text up until 3a.m. and since the moment they woke up in the morning, but Cas knew, they were just. friends. Or were they?</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Cas knew...

Castiel is in love with Dean Winchester. He knows… at least, he _thinks_ he knows he is. He’s been for the past two years, since his first year at the SPN university (does anybody knows what those letters stand for anymore?), the second time the two of them met. Not the first time, god no, that first impression was awful… Well, it should have been for Dean at least, Cas… doesn’t exactly remember. He’s not good at first times, ok? It’s not his fault he passes for a rude jerk, he’s just a newyorker, and it’s not really his fault that Dean’s from Kansas and had an apple-pie life until he went to college, and even then his life continued to be just as easy, while Cas’… well, let’s not talk about that because that’s not important.

What’s important is this: Cas is in love with Dean Winchester. He has been for the past two years because the week after they met, Dean called him using their mutual friend’s pone and asked him to go get a cup of coffee. And they did. And while Dean talked about Cas doesn’t even remember what it was (it’s been two years, for fuck’s sake, you can’t blame the guy for not remembering these things) he does remember that all he could think about was: “ _where has this man been all my life, and why aren’t we getting married right now_?” But a couple of weeks after that marvelous coffee they stopped seeing each other and they didn’t even ran into each-other in campus, like they used to. And a part of Cas felt sad because he really liked that guy, it had been love at second sight, at least for him, it had. And he often wondered whether or not Dean had felt something the first time they met because why else would have he called and asked for a coffee and…?

But then, half-way through his second year of college, Cas’ friend told him that Dean and his childhood friend Benny were together and super-in love, and Cas felt a part of him die. Because he somehow _knew_ Dean, even if he really _didn’t_ , he felt like he did, and he figured _“this is it, this is the love of his life, I am nothing compared to that Benny guy_ ”. And by the time he started seeing Dean on campus again, he was always holding hands with Benny, and Cas had already seen the pictures on Facebook of the two of them in a romantic trip through Europe, so it’s fair to say that by then Castiel had officially given up on hope.

That’s why, when entering his econ class his third year of college, Castiel saw a kind-of-awkward-but-still-hella-good-looking Dean Winchester sitting in the front row, he smiled at the green-eyed boy, but thought nothing of it. As the semester went by, they kept talking more and more, and became closer than they ever had, and even though Castiel’s old crush came back to life completely, he still wouldn’t do anything about it. He knew -he _thought_ he knew- Dean would have needed to know him _a lot_ more before being _sure_ he was worth trusting for more than just a friendship, after all, Benny had been his first and only boyfriend, and they had been best friends practically since birth, they continued to be friends even after breaking up and Cas doesn’t know whether or not he should really feel that jealous about that, but he was.

So they became friends. Cas and Dean. They would hang out, and have lunch together, and they knew each-other’s coffee order by heart, and Dean would go out of his way just to make sure Cas was alright and in his own dorm, and they would text up until 3a.m. and since the moment they woke up in the morning, but Cas _knew_ , they were **just. friends.**   And Cas  _knew_  how lucky he was that _this_ was happening, even if it was just a friendship, he knew his freshman-year-self would have died if he knew he could one day have coffee with Dean on a regular basis and hug him and touch him and just  _look at him_  when the sunlight fell over his face and lighted up all of the little freckles that covered his face. But at the same time, it all felt so surreal, like it was another one of his fantasies and he had finally gone mad. After all, what were the chances of the guy he’d had the hugest crush on for the past two years of his life, finally feeling the same way about him?

It was impossible. Castiel looked back at the past and he thought, he remembered, all the poems he wrote, and the songs he listened to, and the romantic movies he watched, all while thinking of Dean, of this perfect, righteous man, that was just _right_ for him. He looked back at his life, and thought about how all of his ex-partners, both men and women, had either treated him like shit or been treated like shit by him. And he thought, _“this is too good for you, he’s too good for you, you don’t deserve this, you don’t deserve love, especially his”,_ so he would go out on weekends and use more drugs than his body would forgive him for later and hook-up with strangers while thinking it was Dean all along. And we would shed a single tear and whip it quickly before Dean looked back at him from the Starbucks line and smiled that beautiful, perfect, smile of his, right before ordering Cas' favorite mocha, which he knew the dark-haired guy liked with Splenda.


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> He was a friend, a friend who had a crush on his friend: even worse.

When he was introduced to Dean’s family, it was one member at the time, first Sam, then his mom and finally his dad.

He was introduced as a friend, because that was all he was, all he could ever hope to be. Not that he cared, really, “the benefit of the friend is that he gets to spend time with the person he loves”, Cas had read somewhere, and he truly believed it, so he felt blessed that he could at least be around Dean, and enjoy his company, even if it came in a friendship-only package.

And then he also became friends with Sam, not exactly the same kind of friendship he had with the boy’s big brother, but it was a pleasant friendship too, and Sam was a nice guy, and so was Dean’s childhood friend, Jo, who –about a month into their new friendship- started to tease him via text about his feelings towards Dean. By that time, tho, Cas was already an expert in laughing it off and playing dumb.

 

 **Jo:** how come Dean can borrow your weird old greek books and I can’t?

 **Jo:** we both know I’d treat them better than that jerk ever would

 _Me:_ because he has beautiful green eyes and you don’t

 **Jo:** but I have beautiful hazel eyes, doesn’t that count?

 **Jo:** wait, u think his eyes are beautiful?

 _Me:_ shut up, you know I’m kidding

 **Jo:** like hell u are

 **Jo:** dude

 **Jo:** u screwed up

 **Jo:** big

 **Jo:** time

 **Jo:** lol i know about ur lil crush on him

 **Jo:** see? U wont even defend ur self

 _Me:_ Well, anything I say can and WILL be used against me so, I’d rather remain silent, thank you very much

 **Jo:** duuuuuuuuuuuude

 **Jo:** I think he likes you too, btw

 **Jo:** :)

 _Me:_ *rolls eyes*

 

And no, his heart doesn’t twitch for the next week and he doesn’t screenshot that “I think he likes you too, btw” and he doesn’t stare at it for hours. He doesn’t do any of those things… too much.

He just wished he could believe it, but then he sees Dean and he keeps treating him like his “bro” half of the time, but then as _maybe?_ Something else the other half of the time… but he’s surely just hallucinating, he’s had this insane crush on Dean for far too long so now being around him, so close to him all the time… it’s kind of weird and is playing tricks on him. Just like that time Dean’s shoelaces got between his foot and he fell over Castiel and Cas could have swear he had seen a hard-on under Dean’s jeans… so, yeah, this was just like that: his mind was playing tricks on him. There was _no way_ in hell that could have happened. Just like there wasn’t possible that Dean liked him too.

Later, Dean’s parents came over to visit and they went for a coffee a couple of times with Mary, who seemed to love Cas, and Cas thought she was great. And a part of him dreamed, when she and John laughed at his jokes while driving him to his dorm. And when, right before getting out of the car, Dean gave him a big kiss on the cheek, a part of him dreamed that this could actually someday be his life, that that could actually someday be his family.

But he also knew none of that was true. He was a friend, a friend who had a crush on his friend. Even worse. He ended up telling Jo everything, and she promised she wouldn’t say anything, though she did post pictures of them with little heart emojis in her Snapchat story for all of hers and Deans’ friends to see, and that included Benny, which made Cas’ wicked side smile because, well… just ‘cause. He liked Jo. She was nice, a bit intense and weird some times, but nice. He almost didn’t notice when he started hanging out more with her than he did with Dean. Almost.  But he did. He did notice. How couldn’t he? But that happened later, over the summer.

Right now, he and Dean spent all of their spare time together, eating, going to the movies, getting coffee, and getting schoolwork done. Even when they were done with the class they were together in, still Dean would drive to Cas’ dorm and solve his calculus problems on Cas’ desk while he read Kavafis’ poems on his bed, occasionally neglecting the reading in favor of staring at Dean’s back turned to him and fantasizing about them being boyfriends and doing these kind of things together, in between sex rounds. And he sighed. Because he wanted to reach over, and run his finger through Dean’s beautiful soft hair, and caress his cheek and kiss him slowly, like giving a prayer to a Greek god. He wanted to open Dean’s button-up shirt and get down to his knees and take him into his mouth, like taking the communion. He wanted to worship Dean Winchester’s body, like it deserved to be worshiped. Like nothing else mattered in this world. Like he was worth touching Dean in such a way.

But he wasn’t. So he just stared at Dean’s back and absently turned yet another unread page.


	3. Flaws

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> It felt like *this* was going somewhere, whatever this was, and wherever that somewhere could be.

 

He would be lying if he said he didn’t notice Dean’s flaws. He did. He just didn’t want to _acknowledge_ them. He didn’t want to admit out loud that Dean didn’t read something other than Busty Asian Beauties and what was necessary to keep a somewhat decent GPA and that he called Cas a freak for carrying around García Lorca books. Or that he was a bit of a racist, even if most of the time he was “just joking” about it. Or that he didn’t understand why “Blurred lines” was offensive and constantly asked Cas to stop playing KONGOS and Die Antwoord in his own dorm…

And it was kind of Cas’ fault anyway, right? After all, he _had_ spent two years fantasizing about the perfect man for him and putting Dean’s face on him. The engineering student wasn’t exactly to blame for not being into Spanish poetry or South African indie-rock, or for trying to be funny by making jokes about Cas’ last name (“The party and the Motherland need you, Krushnic!” he would say with a heavy accent). The actual problem, was that Cas forgave him for all of that, and thought –because he honestly thought- that Dean just needed time, that his frat-boy façade would fall down if Cas made sure to spend enough time with him so that Dean would trust him enough to let him see that he not only loved García Lorca as much as he did, but liked Bécquer as well. Or, at least, he’d find it cute that Cas loved it so much, even if he didn’t share his interest on it.

He did not like Bécquer as well. He didn’t like Spanish poetry at all, and he honestly thought Cas a freak for liking it so much. Dean _did_ laugh at the fact that Cas’ parents were from Russia. Even when he didn’t understand the sacrifices they had made to get to where they were now and to get his kid into a good school and how hard Cas worked to maintain the scholarship that helped him stay there.

How could he? His whole life had leaked privilege. Not once had he worked for something, all had been given to him easily. He was a good-looking white rich American-born man, who also happened to be hella smart so not even at school needed he to make an effort. So yeah, it was kind of hard to recognize his flaws as such, especially when all of him wanted to just brush them off as mannerisms and little things that reminded him of who Dean Winchester was. And how his being different from Cas was a good thing, and they could teach each other so much.

God, he was so gone.

He’d also be a big fat liar if he said he noticed they never actually talked. Sure, they were together almost all of their time, and they were texting each other constantly, to the point where Cas would every day, without a fail, wake up to either a good-nigh or a good-morning text from Dean, and that always made him start his day off with a smile. Because he kept remembering, what it felt to see Dean walking through campus, his hand in Benny’s, so far away from him. And the fact that he had now been on his crush-for-two-years’ bed (with all of his clothes on, obviously, but _still_ ) made him feel like he was on a chick flick or in one of those Wolfstar fanfictions he read at night. And that felt great. It felt like _this_ was going somewhere, whatever _this_ was, and wherever that somewhere could be.

So he got so caught up in living the moment, in actually doing that carpe diem bullshit he’d been lying to himself about for years, that he forgot to notice the important things. And the important things weren’t memorizing each other’s coffee order, nor hanging around an absurd amount of time together. Those were superficial things. Just like how good a bit of stubble looked on Dean’s face or how he always teased Cas about his heritage. The real stuff…

Well, they never really got to it. Because even though Castiel never noticed, despite their excessive talking, they never _actually_ _talked_ about something that mattered. They joked, they showed each other funny vines, or interesting rock bands and new restaurants they had found and… that was pretty much it. But for Cas it wasn’t. It was something more. It was laughing like an idiot staring at his phone screen, and being unable to listen to Muse’s Starlight without automatically thinking about Dean. And he felt bliss. So he held on to that, and forgot about everything else.

Months later, reflecting on what had happened, he realized he and Dean had never truly got along, and the only thing holding their so-called friendship together was Cas’ belief that it would someday be something else. And he often wondered had he never met Dean during freshmen year, would they even talk to each other? Had they met from scratch during their econ class, would Cas be so much into him, despite all of his flaws?

But that was later, when it all crashed down.

Before, they were just friends, and they hanged out, a lot, and Cas ignored Dean’s flaws.


End file.
